Even as the genocide-accused SL President Mahinda Rajapaksa landed in New Delhi on Wednesday to a warm welcome, MDMK leader Vaiko and over a thousand of his cadres, who had planned a peaceful black flag demonstration against Rajapaska’s inauguration of a Buddhist university at Sanchi, were stopped at the Madhya Pradesh border by that state’s police. Mr. Vaiko along with the other protestors staged a sit-in at the spot where they were stopped, near Pandhurna on the Maharashtra-Madhya Pradesh border, raising banners, placards and slogans against Rajapaksa’s visit to India.
Prior to their being stopped near Pandhurna, Vaiko and the MDMK cadres had stopped over at Nagpur, Maharashtra where arrangements were taken care of by the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP).
The district collector and the state’s police had persuaded the protestors to move to a nearby wedding hall. But Vaiko had responded that they would either go to Sanchi to express their opposition to Rajapaksa’s presence in a democratic manner, else they would court arrest and go to jail.
Citing police sources, PTI reported that the police would take action if the protestors tried to move towards Sanchi.
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